In what will go down as one of the earliest such announcements of any winter weather season in recent memory, there’s no school in several area counties Thursday due to ice accumulations from freezing rain Wednesday night.
Schools are closed in Christian, Todd, Trigg, Hopkins, Muhlenberg, Caldwell and Stewart counties today. Saints Peter and Paul Catholic School, Heritage Christian Academy, all campuses of Hopkinsville Community College and the Murray State Hopkinsville regional campus are also closed. Clarksville-Montgomery County Schools are operating on a one-hour delay.
You can find a complete list of closings, cancellations and delays here.
A Winter Weather Advisory is in effect through 6 p.m., with the National Weather Service in Paducah saying light snow or freezing rain will remain possible through the morning before becoming all rain later in the day. Only very minor additional accumulations are expected.
While one-to-two inches of snow had been forecast by many for the southern Pennyrile, freezing rain was the story. Ice downed several trees and some power lines, causing numerous power outages in the region.
Pennyrile Electric crews remain out in the elements, with about 320 members still without power in Todd County early this morning, about 150 in Christian County and approximately 540 members in Logan County are in the dark.
Christian County ECC knew of no power outages in the city limits and said there were no accidents overnight. Todd County Dispatch also reported no wintry-weather-wrecks and Trigg County had no overnight problems and no significant power outages as of the early morning hours.
Christian County Sheriff’s Deputy Spencer Turner says roads are mostly wet, but motorists should be on the lookout for black ice during their morning commute.
He says they didn’t have any additional reports of trees falling across roadways during the overnight and early morning hours.
There were a couple of black ice-related accidents with minor injuries reported about 5:20 a.m. at the Pennryrile Parkway-Interstate 24 interchange.
Any ice that doesn’t melt today should tomorrow, with the high temperature Friday forecast to be in the upper 40’s.